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His heart will be damnation or salvation.
“—you can still save us.”
Cyrus looks at me, eyes greener than green, like he did all those times before, like I’m a star he’s wished upon. He was enamored with a girl he imagined, one with a heart of gold, not ice. One with courage, not artifice. The hole in his chest should be evidence that I will never be who he wants.
But he loves me anyway. That’s his true curse.
That burgeoning regret catches up to my senses.What have I done to him?The very worst possible. It’s too late. He is more beast than prince. I am more monster than girl.
There is no future for us.
“Violet,” he pleads as his body is destroyed. He knows what my name on his lips does to me, and uttered now, it’s like a chisel between my ribs.
I can’t look away. I want to reach out—take his hand like a miracle as if I could save him again.
He is still mine. Mine through the loathing, the lies, and the truths.
Mine to ruin. Mine to love.
I hate him.
But don’t I love him, too?
The only thing that is inevitable is us.
“It really does make fools of you all,” the witch tsks. Shewatches us with rounded dark eyes. “I will tell you now: humans are built to bleed. Hope was an afterthought. You are gobblers, leeches, burnt scrapings from the bottom of a pot. Nothing but ascourge.Love will not save you.”
In one swift motion, she brandishes a dagger from inside her robe and hurls it at Cyrus.
He blocks against a lethal strike before I can find breath to scream. The dagger embeds itself in his upper arm instead of his chest, and milky sap runs down the length of his arm, alongside rivulets of blood.
My body makes its choice for me. I fling the nearest tea tray at the witch, hitting her in the thigh and only causing a scowl, but it’s enough to distract her as I throw myself at her too.
Glass shatters as we knock into the curio cabinet. I fall with her, snagging scrapes and cuts on the way. I’m wrenched away midair—Cyrus catches me before I hit the ground.
His weight lurches; he holds on to me as much as I hold on to him. “Take the dagger,” he gasps.
As I grab for it, the vines at my feet crawl up my ankles, constricting them and making me trip.
The witch rises, face bloody. She draws out a glowing ball from her pocket; within it, five lights blink. Nadiya’s fairies. She holds it out, fingers sinking into the orb as she absorbs its power. “So you choose him still. Then suffer like him.”
The rest of the growth surges upward to separate me from Cyrus. The vines crawl higher and thorns dig into my leg. I cry out.
The witch crunches through the broken glass toward us.Maybe I would’ve always gone down this way—fighting, hurting, foaming mad.
I don’t want to die like this.
I don’t want to die.
Cyrus loves me. His heart is worth more than all the ones she claimed. If she can do this magic, so can I.
I shut my eyes and reach for my Sight. A caustic energy bleeds through my mind, a shadowy antithesis to the golden threads of time. Touching upon it, I sense the vines coiling up my legs. I see them beyond their physical form, as magic that I can twist and dissolve for my own means.
The vines seize and snap apart. I stagger forward, freed. Cyrus groans sharply.
“Ah, a quick learner.” The witch raises new bramble as the fairies inside her orb squeal and squeak. I tear each vine apart by the stem before it can latch on. “But did you know that when you call upon your power, you drain his? His cursed heart fuels your magic, but it is mortal yet. Will you kill him to rid me?”
“Yes,” I pant. My fingers just brush the dagger’s handle in Cyrus’s arm. I grip it fully and tear it free. He howls. I lunge and slice a ragged tear through the witch’s robe, gouging flesh.
